2025-2026 Tank Race Prediction Contest and Current Results Thread

Ferguson_Mellochill said:

Maybe just a small statue inside the arena would be appropriate. Luka will have a big statue out front next to Kobe & Shaq.

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George W said:

If Kessler wasn’t injured, and with Lauri and Keyonte playing like this, we might have even cleared the play-in.

- George

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HermanG said:

Many smart people in here completely fail to acknowledge that assets come in three forms:
- Your own picks
- Other teams picks/swaps you own
- Value of your players/contracts

I dont get how those in favor of tanking are so blind to #2 and #3. The way Lauri and Keyonte are building up their value right now is improving our overall asset value way more than 2-3 positions in the standings table. Let them ball. You cant have it both ways.

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fishonjazz said:

I think an NBA MVP improves our asset value the most though.
I also think that if key and Lauri played the exact same as they did last night but vucivic hits that 3 at the buzzer and we lose in triple OT then key and Lauri have the same asset value as they do when vuc missed that shot.
In that way, we could have it both ways. To bad vuc missed the 3 at the buzzer.
#2 has nothing to do with us tanking last night's game since we don't own any bulls picks.

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HermanG said:

#2 has everything to do with the value of your players/contracts. You dont give up value from #1 to get #2 generally, you trade players to get the picks. Besides my comment didnt have much to do with the Bulls game, but the fact that people are demanding the FO intervenes with us playing good basketball.

I dont want to lose the pick either, and I'd rather have good lottery odds.... but its not "end all be all" in building a contender. We may be able to trade Lauri for a prospect that turns out to be "the guy", if he builds up his value enough.

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Ferguson_Mellochill said:

Jazz need to go 2-10 over the next 12 games. That would make them 7-18 in their first 25 games.

Last year, they were 5-20 in their first 25 games. So we'd be 2 games ahead of last year's win pace.

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Schrödinger's Gerbil said:

Hey everyone. With so much chatter lately about the Jazz’s 2026 draft pick situation and what level of “tanking” might actually be necessary to keep it, I wanted to step back and take a more systematic look at where things stand to ground the discussion in some numbers and realistic scenarios about how the league’s bottom tier is shaping up.
Quick refresh, just in case anyone here isn’t up on the situation: Utah’s 2026 first-round pick is top-8 protected; if it lands 9th or worse, it conveys to OKC. This makes finishing among the league’s bottom-4 the only surefire path to keeping the pick. If we finish with the 5th–7th worst record, then we enter the danger zone, but still reasonably comfortable. If we finish with the 8th-14th worst record, our only course is to pray to the lottery gods.
Below is the lottery math we need to consider (rounded Tankathon odds by seed). The rightmost column is the chance of finishing top-8 (i.e., keeping the pick):

Seed (Worst Record)​	Pick #1​	Pick #2​	Pick #3​	Pick #4​	Pick #5​	Pick #6​	Pick #7​	Pick #8​	Chance to Keep Pick (Top-8)​
5th	10.5%	10.5%	10.6%	10.5%	2.2%	19.6%	26.7%	8.7%	99.3%
6th	9.0%	9.2%	9.4%	9.6%	—	8.6%	29.8%	20.5%	96.1%
7th	7.5%	7.8%	8.1%	8.5%	—	—	19.7%	34.1%	85.7%
8th	6.0%	6.3%	6.7%	7.2%	—	—	—	34.5%	61.7%
9th	4.5%	4.8%	5.2%	5.7%	—	—	—	—	20.2%
10th	3.0%	3.3%	3.6%	4.0%	—	—	—	—	13.9%

Now, a review of the current NBA landscape. Brooklyn and Washington are highly likely to finish worse than Utah; they’re the two teams you can almost certainly pencil in below us, meaning that we will finish with, at best, the third-worst record. Sacramento looks increasingly likely to join them (due to roster dysfunction, front-office noise, and increasing pressure to blow it up), while Memphis remains a wild card. If Ja Morant & the Grizzlies resolve things, they’ll likely climb in the standings. If, however, they decide to move on from Ja, something that appears increasingly likely, the odds are reasonable that they’ll finish below the Jazz.
Indiana, Dallas, and Boston have injured players and are the “could go either way” group. Once Indiana and Dallas improve their health (i.e., Davis will return for Dallas, while Irving may return, and Mathurin and Toppin will eventually return for Indiana), they will likely improve. Boston appears committed to trying to win so far, but it’s not implausible that this commitment may change. If injuries and losses continue to mount for Dallas and Indiana, and losses continue to mount for Boston, one, two, or all three may eventually decide to tank the season. In my view, the likelihood is highest for Indiana, followed by Dallas and Boston.
New Orleans and Charlotte are talent-poor, bottom-tier teams; however, both appear to be making an effort to win. Indeed, New Orleans has no draft pick in 2026 and thus no incentive to tank. However, they are a struggling team reliant on a brittle “superstar” and plagued by organizational dysfunction. I sense that Charlotte is tired of tanking/losing and is incentivized to begin turning things around this season, IF Miller and Ball can remain healthy (big ifs)/
The Clippers have looked overrated, are aging, and are dependent on an utterly unreliable, brittle superstar. However, they are largely comprised of solid, if old veteran talent. Their baseline appears higher than their current performance indicates.
Taking all of the above into account, the table below assigns each of the above teams into one of five categories related to their likelihood of finishing below the Jazz: Highly Likely, Likely, Possibly, Less Likely, Unlikely.

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Likelihood of Finishing Below the Jazz ​

Category​	Teams​	Rationale​
Highly Likely	Brooklyn, Washington	Both teams are terrible, openly non-competitive, and structurally incapable of midseason improvement. They are virtual locks to finish with worse records than Utah.
Likely	Sacramento, New Orleans	Sacramento is a mess with poor talent, a bad start, and high blow-it-up potential. New Orleans is chronically injured, dysfunctional, and overly reliant on Zion, who rarely stays healthy. Both are strong candidates to land below Utah.
Possibly	Memphis, Indiana	Memphis could rebound if Ja Morant re-engages, but their depth and chemistry issues remain severe, and a mid-season teardown is in the cards. Indiana should improve as injured players return, but their early-season hole and lack of top-tier talent keep a bottom-tier finish on the table.
Less Likely	Dallas, Boston, Charlotte	Dallas expects to improve as key players return. Charlotte is bad but trying with some, if not overwhelming, NBA talent. All three could finish below Utah, particularly if Dallas and/or Boston decide to throw in the towel for the year, but it would require things to break wrong for them and right for the Jazz.
Unlikely	Clippers	Old roster, overrated, and dependent on an injury-prone star, but still too much baseline talent to realistically project as worse than Utah barring catastrophic collapse.

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Taking the above into account, the Jazz appear heading for, at best, the fifth-worst record in the league, and possibly the sixth or seventh-worst record. If accurate, they will not be guaranteed their 2026 draft pick, but will still have very good odds of retaining it, as high as 99.3% and no lower than 85.7%. This entails risk, but it should not be a cause for excessive worry (though some worry is obviously warranted). What the Jazz absolutely want to avoid is falling to the eighth-worst record, in which case the odds are only moderately better than a coin flip, or below.
The question, therefore, is: What is the likelihood that seven teams finish with a worse record than the Jazz?
Frankly, I think shooting for a no better than the seventh-worst finish is very doable. If the Jazz FO begins to sweat, I fully expect it will take steps to manage the risk, notwithstanding its statements that they would not do so this year, such as sitting Markennan or other players with phantom injuries or experimenting with creative lineups. The only way I don’t see them engaging in creative tanking strategies is if the youth gel and begin balling out, in which case it may prove untenable to hold them back. That would at least offer some solace for losing the draft pick.
Although I despise tanking with a passion, we’re too far down this road to give up on it this year. I don’t see much option other than to see it through, as distasteful as it is. I fully expect, however, that after this year, and after securing yet another lottery pick, the Jazz will pivot next year to trying to compete and win, and begin pushing for the postseason sooner rather than later.

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Zombie said:

Should be doable.

If we expand that view out to next 20 games, we're still only favored to win 2 of them, bolded below. I suspect they'll actually win more than two, but man this is a tough stretch, even 5 wins seems like a big ask.

@ Lakers
vs OKC
vs Lakers
@ Golden State
vs Sacramento
vs Houston
vs Houston
@ Brooklyn
@ New York
vs OKC
vs Lakers
vs Orlando
@ Denver
vs Memphis
vs Detroit
@ San Antonio
vs Boston
@ Clippers
@ Golden State
@ Portland

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